Dark Benediction

Seevers winked solemnly. “Now begins the downfall of the parasites—their decadence. They concentrated all their efforts along the lines of… uh… scientific farming, you might say. They began growing various sorts of defense and attack weapons for their hosts—weird biodevices, perhaps. Horns, swords, fangs, stingers, poisonthrowers—we can only guess. But eventually, one group of parasites hit upon—what?”

Paul, who was beginning to stir uneasily, could only stammer. Where was Seevers getting all this?

“Say it!” the scientist demanded.

“The… nervous system?”

“That’s right. You don’t need to whisper it. The nervous system. It was probably an unsuccessful parasite at first, because nerve tissue grows slowly. And it’s a long stretch of evolution between a microspecies which could stimulate nerve growth and one which could direct and utilize that growth for the host’s advantage—and for its own. But at last, after a long struggle, our little species gets there. It begins sharpening the host’s senses, building up complex senses from aggregates of old style receptors, and increasing the host’s intelligence within limits.”

Seevers grinned mischievously. “Comes a planetary shake-up of the first magnitude. Such parasites would naturally pick the host species with the highest intelligence to begin with. With the extra boost, this brainy animal quickly beats down its own enemies, and consequently the enemies of its microbenefactor. It puts itself in much the same position that Man’s in on Earth—lord it over the beasts, divine right to run the place, and all that. Now understand—it’s the animal who’s become intelligent, not the parasites. The parasites are operating on complex instinct patterns, like a hive of bees. They’re wonderful neurological engineers—like bees are good structural engineers; blind instinct, accumulated through evolution.”

He paused to light a cigarette. “If you feel ill, young man, there’s drinking water in that bottle. You look ill.”

“I’m all right!”

“Well, to continue: The intelligent animal became master of his planet. Threats to his existence were overcome—unless he was a threat to himself, like we are. But now, the parasites had found a safe home. No new threats to force readaption. They sat back and sighed and became stagnant—as unchanging as horseshoe crabs or amoeba or other Earth ancients. They kept right on working in their neurological beehives, and now they became cultivated by the animal, who recognized their benefactors. They didn’t know it, but they were no longer the dominant species. They had insured their survival by leaning on their animal prop, who now took care of them with godlike charity—and selfishness. The parasites had achieved biological heaven. They kept on working, but they stopped fighting. The host was their welfare state, you might say. End of a sequence.”

He blew a long breath of smoke and leaned forward to watch Paul, with casual amusement. Paul suddenly realized that he was sitting on the edge of his chair and gaping. He forced a relaxation.

“Wild guesswork,” he breathed uncertainly.

“Some of it’s guesswork,” Seevers admitted. “But none of it’s wild. There is supporting evidence. It’s in the form of a message.”

“Message?”

“Sure. Come, I’ll show you.” Seevers arose and moved toward the wall. He stopped before the two hemispheres. “On second thought, you better show yourself. Take down that sliced meteorite, will you? It’s sterile.”

Paul crossed the room, climbed unsteadily upon a bench, and brought down the globular meteorite. It was the first time he had examined one of the things, and he inspected it curiously. It was a near-perfect sphere, about eight inches in diameter, with a four-inch hollow in the center. The globe was made up of several concentric shells, tightly fitted, each apparently of a different metal. It was not seemingly heavier than aluminum, although the outer shell was obviously of tough steel.

“Set it face down,” Seevers told him. Both halves. Give it a quick little twist. The shells will come apart. Take out the center shell—the hard, thin one between the soft protecting shells.”

“How do you know their purposes?” Paul growled as he followed instructions. The shells came apart easily.

“Envelopes are to protect messages,” snorted Seevers.

Paul sorted out the hemispheres, and found two mirror-polished shells of paper-thin tough metal. They bore no inscription, either inside or out. He gave Seevers a puzzled frown.

“Handle them carefully while they’re out of the protectors. They’re already a little blurred…”

“I don’t see any message.”

“There’s a small bottle of iron filings in that drawer by your knee. Sift them carefully over the outside of the shells. That powder isn’t fine enough, really, but it’s the best I could do. Felger had some better stuff up at Princeton, before we all got out. This business wasn’t my discovery, incidentally.”